The industry of manufacturing and delivering personalized documents such as identification and financial cards, the likes of which include credit cards, drivers' licenses, and passports, requires a number of hardware devices, also called platforms. There are several different functions of the machines and there may be separate machines or mechanisms within the same machine to perform these functions. One such machine and/or function creates the personalized documents, and the actual structures may vary from high-volume central-issuance personalization systems to low-volume or individualized desktop personalization machines. These machines, manufactured by a number of different companies, may have proprietary configurations and production managers, and are capable of performing one or more of the following examples of personalization: multi-color and monochromatic printing, magnetic stripe encoding, integrated circuit chip programming, embossing, indent printing, laser engraving, and laminating, among others.
Another type of machine and/or function is primarily associated with the delivery of these personalized documents and includes a printer that produces forms, often called mailer forms. The personalized document is either contained within or attached to these mailer forms. The document and the mailer form are then sent to an intended recipient, often by mail. The mailer form may also have printed personalized information, such as the recipient's name and address. The form printer may be integrated with the document creation and personalization machine, in which case the personalized document is attached to its respective mailer form by the machine system.
Additional machines exist for the fulfillment and delivery of the mailer forms and the attached personalized document(s) that may actually fold and insert the folded forms into an envelope for delivery to the recipient.
Heretofore, the operations of the various machines have been controlled by one or more production managers, control software that manages the entire system and is programmed to operate only with specific machines. If the user wants to utilize a new machine(s) for the creation, personalization, creation and/or printing a mailer form, or attachment of the personalized document to the mailer form, extensive reprogramming of the production manager was required to coordinate the functions among the different machines. The difficulties to incorporate existing production managers with new machines can be exasperating, difficult and expensive, and often discourages such changes.
Needed are a system, method, a product, and a service to facilitate the integration of new machines with an existing production manager(s).